


in the mood for love

by nascar



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, Coming of Age, Domestic Violence, Hong Kong, Intimacy, M/M, Making Out, city boys learnin about love!, jeno drools, linear... to an extent
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2019-12-29 22:57:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18303494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nascar/pseuds/nascar
Summary: “Jaemin please, it’s what this band needs. Babies always save marriages.”“Hyuck you fool, you already have a pet. A five foot eleven pet that takes up half our living space and food.”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> for era ♡  
> [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/user/celvish/playlist/6AycOmaWosxOErGN7yEEoW?si=fBmuxIxnTXy6Q2Ac-vkkoQ) \+ check out this amazing [art](http://twitter.com/ramenjae/status/1113760943836553216/) by my lovie grace

 

 

_Sleeping together in the school of grief,_

_Snobbish, whispers, burning for love,_

_And all their learning looked ambiguous,_

_From soft chalk and not leaves,_

_Not real– and the light_

_Trembled like tears upon their eyelids._

                                         – “Hong Kong”, Patrick Anderson

  


The night Donghyuck runs away it’s his seventeenth birthday and he’s bleeding from nose to ear. He’s seventeen for three minutes and thirty-three seconds when his father hits him for the first time.

 

Not the first time that he’s been smacked before, because he’s been smacked plenty. This is the first time he’s been properly _hit_ though, fist to mouth.

 

His mother screams this short noise into her flat palm and when Donghyuck turns to see where she’s protected behind him all she says is, “You shouldn’t have done that.” So he runs away. With his band.

 

He’s gone after that. Fucking dust! Toast baby!

 

He’s seventeen for two hours, three minutes and fifty-five seconds when he takes his last look at his postage stamp bedroom. There’s not much to say goodbye to, no decorations, no pets, just a bed shoved in the corner and a tall mirror that he breathes heavily into. SoHo wasn’t much of a neighborhood anyways.

 

Jaemin picks him up, parked discreetly in a space little bigger than an alleyway. The drive to Tsim Sha Tsui is a silent one, ten minutes to get to Jaemin’s flat, seven to park, and three on the elevator.

 

Nobody speaks until Donghyuck finally finds it in himself to cry, once the door is shut and he’s gone, really gone, then he cries. Right into Jaemin’s expensive dress shirt that probably cost more than Donghyuck’s life.

 

“I’ve got you,” Jaemin tells him, patting the back of his head. “You’re safe.”

 

/

 

Meeting Jeno went a little like:

 

Red bean bags spilling over the entrance of the backroom at Beats club. There were red cups too. No alcohol because they were all underage. Donghyuck was seventeen.

 

Seventeen and messy. Messy like spilling orange juice over the crotch of his pants laughing at Chenle’s comparison of Renjun to Van Halen. _Out!_ Chenle giggled, _gone baby! Again!_

 

There were no paper towels in the men’s bathroom but there was a boy just a bit taller than Donghyuck, with a shock of black hair and these big saucer eyes. He was kittenish too, kittenish like, Donghyuck can’t explain.

 

“Accident?” He asked, glancing at the dark patch of Donghyuck’s jeans.

 

“Orange Juice.”

 

A solemn nod from Jeno. They waited in silence for a moment before:

 

“Your band is good.” Jeno says at the same time that Donghyuck asks where the napkins are.

 

They both laugh and Donghyuck smiles at him in a way that feels new, like he’s finally shoveling the static off of his shoulders.

 

/

 

“He’s so fucking hot.” sixteen-year old Donghyuck’s throat goes dry. Sahara dry. Dry in the way that only the shimmering sweat off of Jung Jaehyun’s abs can quench. It’s all a little gross, a little _sexy._ Ok, not sexy now, but sexy then. A long-ago sexy. _Embarrassing._

 

Renjun is drooling into his palm, forehead pressed against the cool glass. He’s way past being saveable from the Jung Jaehyun effect. (or the Yoonoh effect to Renjun, because _he likes that name better, when I say it that makes us like, soulmates_ ).

 

Mark sits behind both of them watching with poorly concealed judgment. Jaehyun isn’t his type, or at least that’s what he says. Jaehyun is everyone’s type though. He’s got the most serene smile you’ve ever seen, and the dips in his abdomen are heaven sent. He was born on fucking valentines, he’s positively love-of-your-life shaped.

 

Mark’s eyes are on someone else though.

 

It’s easier for Donghyuck not to know, so he pretends like he doesn’t. Both of them know though, they know. If you know you _know_ , and Renjun doesn’t know.

 

/

 

Renjun finally knows the night that he quits the band for the first time.

 

He knows that he’s been occupying Mark’s mouth and hands as a placeholder. He knows that much. He knows what they have is supposed to be fun, a distraction. From what? Renjun didn’t know. Probably assumed it was some girl back in Vancouver.

 

The rude awakening came after ten shots and a game of truth or dare that triggered Donghyuck’s fight or flight like nothing else.

 

“I love you.” Mark slurred into Donghyuck’s neck, petrified.

 

Renjun hadn’t lasted the rest of the night, not by a long shot.

 

/

 

Mark was in love with a younger Donghyuck. A Donghyuck that was made of little glares and a fluff of blood orange hair, untamed. Mark was in love with a little flame of Donghyuck. That Donghyuck with moxy, Donghyuck before Donghyuck of _now._ A Donghyuck who was a little less earth shaken.

 

A Donghyuck like a bright translucent daydream.

 

Being honest, Donghyuck had figured that Mark would get bored of being given nothing. Bored of having nothing of Donghyuck to survive on. He’d prefer it.

 

Because the second Donghyuck lays eyes on Jeno it’s day one. Like every day before that is day zero, and day negative one. Not a day counted until stupid Jeno. Nothing counted besides him after either.

 

Not to say that Jeno is everything, because he isn’t, he’s not really. Jeno is enough though, and he gets it.

 

It isn’t love at first sight when Donghyuck first meets Jeno. He doesn’t believe in that shit. He likes it slow, serendipitous. He likes the wait and the slow etch of Jeno’s eyes.

 

Mark never had a chance, strike-out, game over.

 

/

 

A back door bangs open and grainy green bleeds into their first kiss, illuminating Kowloon goldfish market in orange and lighting them up like a festival lantern. Jeno has dragon eyes in this light and Donghyuck is suddenly made of paper bag lungs. He likes how his chest burns.

 

The lighting is balmy ocher under the cut of Jeno’s jaw, Donghyuck speculates he’d taste like tangerine if he were to bite into him.

 

Clammy hands run the length of Donghyuck’s back, rucking up his shirt at his hip where the cold air follows, damp.

 

Donghyuck’s hands find his way to Jeno’s mess of slipshod hair and he tugs back, harder than intended but enough to pull them apart. Jeno whines, it echoes, Donghyuck finds his voice tastes like spearmint and fog.

 

“I really like you, Jeno.”

 

Jeno says he likes him too and then they kiss again.

 

When they pull apart Donghyuck repeats it, he repeats it until Jeno is kissing the words out of his mouth and pushes Donghyuck into the plaster wall.

 

He melts under moon eyes and soft knuckles.

 

/

 

Jaemin’s flat in Tsim Sha Tsui is a gift from his parents. His actual house is up on Victoria Peak, where his maids have to get clearance from the government to enter. It’s just rich people bullshit.

 

So the band camps out at the flat after school and during weekends. It’s not hard for the place to become a dump but Jaemin is Jaemin so it doesn’t, really. There’s also Jeno, who kind of becomes the band’s unofficial pet.

 

Mark calls him a roadie and Jeno doesn’t complain, so he’s a roadie, technically. It’s not like he’s going to say no to free food and a bed to hog Donghyuck in.

 

He has his own place with his mother in Jordan. His mom is a herbalist and his father does trade in the Jade Market. It’s not like he’s poor, he even fixes washing machines for his apartment complex occasionally for pocket money.

 

He stays at the flat for Donghyuck. Donghyuck knows that and every time he remembers he’s filled with a sly satisfaction. The cat that got the fucking cream.

 

/

 

Donghyuck is lead singer. He’s been lead singer since eighth grade when Na Jaemin asked him to sing him something pretty because he’s _starting a fucking band. I’ve got too much money._

 

So he did, sing him something pretty, and when he was finished Jaemin whistled low and rocked back on his heels. Savoring the breeze for a second before tossing an arm over Donghyuck’s shoulder and telling him, _Hyuckie you sly dog, that was fucking precious man. You’re the grossest boy I’ve ever met but god be damned, that was precious._

 

So Blinders is born. Donghyuck on vocals and lead guitar, Renjun on keyboard, Mark with the drums and Jaemin on bass.

 

It’s a real set up. Two boys from the Lan Kwai Fong neighborhood become the other unofficial roadies. Chenle and Jisung start hanging around for their practices and next thing Donghyuck knows they’re _the roadies._

 

Chenle, in spite of Jeno’s gentle nature, abhors that. “It’s so insulting,” Chenle tells Jeno, miffed. “You’re so obedient it’s embarrassing. It’s dehumanizing. How can you let them call you that?”

 

Jeno says nothing but smiles in this sick angel way at Donghyuck and Chenle groans into Jisung’s understanding shoulder.

 

/

 

They have one more roadie, for a few weeks at least. This one is a proper roadie. Her name is Yerim and she’s ready to eat Jaemin, wallet and all. She’s really pretty, nice too. But not too nice, Donghyuck reminds himself making sure to tighten his grip on Jeno when she walks by.

 

It’s a silly notion, Jeno is just about the most loyal guard dog there is. She still gives Donghyuck the skeeves.

 

After five weeks though, Jaemin finally gives in at Yukhei’s loft party and goes to kiss her. She lets him for a good two minutes before she pushes him off and asks him to introduce her to his cousin Heejin.

 

/

 

Jisung is annoying. Not Chenle annoying but, annoying in only the way that Jisung can be. Which is sometimes worse. He’s cocky and underwhelming at the same time and he’s gifting Jeno the skankiest pair of lingerie on the island for Christmas.

 

“Are these even legal?” Renjun asks, peering over Jeno’s shoulder.

 

Jisung shrugs and hands Jeno the card that comes with them.

 

For the truest groupie, thought you’d like the official uniform - Jisung <3

 

“Don’t listen to them baby,” Donghyuck tells Jeno in the most chastised voice he can manage. He covers Jeno’s eyes and plucks the offending garment out of Jeno’s sweet, unassuming hands. The damage is already done though and the gears in Jeno’s head seem to be working full speed.

 

/

 

Jeno is so wet and sloppy, drooly. It’s _grody_ and he kisses everywhere. He’s gross, and Donghyuck likes it. One of Jeno’s thumbs press into a bruise at the base of Donghyuck’s throat and when Donghyuck hisses in pain Jeno licks right along his teeth. Yuck.

 

His mind is working a mile a minute, kissing up the string of spit from Jeno’s chin while tugging on the ratty bracelets on Jeno’s wrist.

 

If this was anyone but Jeno, it wouldn’t matter, Donghyuck realizes. Only Jeno matters. Jeno settles over Donghyuck’s thighs and under him, it isn’t that hard to feel small. When Jeno licks into his mouth it’s good enough to make him want to fall in love.

 

Jeno kisses clumsy, he kisses blind, fumbling for Donghyuck’s mouth and halfway slobbering over the lower half of Donghyuck’s chin. He sucks and bites and _devours_ what he’s given.

 

Donghyuck’s eyes near roll into the back of his head when the disgusting kiss Jeno is giving him breaks off and travels down to his neck. Jeno’s hands shove his shirt up to his collar bones. The noise he makes is embarrassing and he finds himself locking ankles behind Jeno’s back.

 

Jeno is messy over his chest and stomach, biting and latching onto every bit of skin. The way he’s drooling makes Donghyuck rethink the time he’d called Jeno _kitten._ No, he’s definitely more of a dog, a gross, slobbery, sloppy dog, with big eyes and a loyal heart.

 

He tells him as much and Jeno laughs about it up against his sternum.

 

It reminds him of how he’d begged Jaemin for a band pet.

 

(“Jaemin please, it’s what this band needs. Babies always save marriages.”

 

“Hyuck you fool, you already have a pet. A five foot eleven pet that takes up half our living space and food.”)

 

/

 

Jeno looks eager, breath coming out in heady little puffs when he bites into the skin of Donghyuck’s thigh. Like a piranha.

 

“So sharp baby,” Donghyuck tells the ceiling, a hand tangling in Jeno’s hair.

 

Jeno mumbles something akin to an apology into the tender skin but he’s a filthy liar because he does it again, harder.

 

Jaemin comes to tell them about the new gig when Donghyuck has Jeno by the hair between his legs, glossy eyed and fixated on biting into the skin of Donghyuck’s thighs.

 

However, Jeno’s focus is, fortunately, or not, indestructible; even Donghyuck’s rubber duck print boxers don’t even seem to sour the mood, always a plus.

 

Donghyuck almost feels bad when Jaemin closes the door and whines something about regretting adopting so many problem gays. Almost.

 

/

 

Donghyuck’s mother calls to ask for him on his eighteenth birthday. Her voice is wet and crackly through the receiver.

 

_Come back Donghyuck, please he isn’t so bad anymore. I need you here baby._

 

The phone feels like dead weight in his hand.

 

/

 

“I hate the World,” Donghyuck says like he means it and tosses the guitar pick into the air.

 

Jeno’s head emerges from the pile of blankets and he blinks slowly. A tuft of hair defies gravity and sticks straight up off his forehead. Donghyuck stares back at him for a moment before deciding, “Not you Jen, I hate the world but not you.”

 

Jeno must be satisfied with that because then he disappears back into his nest, a sleepy smile curls under his eyes.

 

/

 

Donghyuck turns eighteen with a bottle of jack and glitter rock.

 

Donghyuck isn’t the bassist. Jaemin is the bassist. So technically it’s Jaemin’s guitar that he smashes into the stage, and Jaemin’s guitar that he stomps on and Jaemin’s guitar that he snaps in half at the neck.

 

And Jaemin that lets his head drop into his hands when Donghyuck is off stage after the show, still drunk, still out of line. Nice.

 

Mark is collateral damage at this point, just in the way. That’s how he ends up pressed up against the staff closet with Donghyuck’s fangs at his throat. Donghyuck thinks he hears a hail mary in there somewhere before he bites into his best friend’s neck and then rolls up against his lips, feeling Mark’s sweaty bangs against his own forehead.

 

He feels cool and Dangerous in Mark’s hands (or against them?). It’s all whatever, it’s fun. He feels betted on, he’s rolling the dice and scoring up, with a bitch on the line like Renjun. Sad everyone isn’t like Mark.

 

Donghyuck doesn’t even know what’s happening anymore. He feels poisoned and he’s missing the feeling of burying himself alive.

 

“Donghyuck. Lee Donghyuck.”

 

Oh, he’s blackout drunk. Mark has yellow eyes when Donghyuck is pulled off of him. Cool baby, this is fucking cool. He must say as much because then Jaemin? Is saying _not cool Hyuck Lee this isn’t fucking cool._

 

What does Jaemin even know about _cool_? Donghyuck has gone mattress surfing off his own goddamn roof on an acid tab and broke his arm in two places after his father punched his mom. He’s even done uncool things like hiding underneath his bed when the shoulders were being slammed into his front door again and again. He knows about cool and uncool. What the fuck would Jaemin know?

 

He must say that out loud too because the whole room feels like one big heaving depressive sigh. He feels a little like the turtle he’d found outside when he was younger and kept under his bed in a shoebox until his mother found it.

 

“Oh fuck off,” Donghyuck tells them. They don’t get it. “Fuck all of you, don’t patronize me Jaemin.”

 

The hands under his arms shake a little and he imagines it must be taking a tremendous and impressive amount of self-control to not punch him dead.

 

Renjun leaves then, the door slams behind him and Donghyuck laughs at that, wiping his mouth. “Is anyone gonna get that?” He asks.

 

Mark looks at him like he’s drowning, he looks pathetic and Donghyuck laughs at that. “Pick and choose Mark.”

 

There’s a new voice coming from where the door has reopened. “I’ve got him.”

 

Oh, Donghyuck likes that. He halfway purrs looking for the voice. Jeno’s hands wrap around his torso and pull his weight off of Jaemin until Donghyuck lands on his chest with an ‘oof.’

 

“Missed you, baby,” He tells Jeno, nose pressed into his armpit.

 

He doesn’t think Jeno appreciates the sentiment from how he tries to hold Donghyuck at arm’s length, away from him like he’s done something wrong. He probably has, when has he ever done anything right? That’s why his dad hit him, isn’t it?

 

“M’sorry,” he slurs absently before he blacks out against Jeno.

 

Happy fucking birthday.  

 

/

 

Jeno doesn’t talk to him for a week after. He dumps him off at Jaemin’s place with a bottle of aspirin, a bottle of water, and some green powder from Jeno’s mom that smelled worse than whatever was about to come up his throat.

 

Donghyuck feels like, for lack of better word, ass. The capital L lowest he’s ever been.

 

For one, even Jaemin won’t talk to him. Two, he’s caught something and has been hurling his guts up Monday to Wednesday, he’s lost both his best friends and his… Jeno? He isn’t quite sure what they are, or were. Or if they’re anything now.

 

He’s royally fucked up. In ways he probably doesn’t even remember. He should probably apologize to someone.

 

He plans on it, as soon as he’s done being too sick to stand.

 

He can see the way the flat is tense with his presence. Nobody comes around but Jaemin. When they do it’s only when he’s sleeping, or when they think he’s sleeping. He can hear voices in the kitchen late at night. Sometimes they sound tired and other time he thinks he can hear his name being sworn up, down, and ass end over itself.

 

So that’s why when Jaemin is dead asleep, at two in the morning, Donghyuck finds it in himself to _not_ throw up for an hour or so and pack his bag. He has about 1805 HK$ stashed under his mattress, it’s enough for a dingy hotel room for two nights and maybe some groceries.

 

It’s not much but to him, his friend’s happiness is worth more.

 

So he hitches a ride on the night bus

 

/

 

Jaemin texts him the next day.

 

**_Jaemin 4:45 pm_ **

hyuck where are you

 

why isnt ur stuff here?

 

Donghyuck turns his phone off.

 

/

 

“Did you stalk me?”

 

“No? What the fuck?” Jisung makes himself at home on Donghyuck’s motel couch. He _looks_ a little like a stalker.

 

“Then how did you find me here?”

 

“I have my ways,” Jisung tells him, and Donghyuck can believe it.

 

“Misery loves company,” Donghyuck mumbles into his knee from where he perches on the corner of the bed.

 

“Shut up, that doesn’t matter, stop trying to distract me. I’m here because,” dramatic pause, “Well a couple reasons. One being, I’m sure you don’t want _Chenle_ coming after you.” He does a little cross symbol, touching his forehead then shoulders. He is also right, that would be a nightmare.“Two, your sweetheart Jeno is ruining my life.”

 

Donghyuck perks up at that. “Jeno? You’re here for Jeno?”

 

Jisung looks like he wants to barf for two seconds, Donghyuck can relate, but then he says, “No not just that, there’s a plethora of reasons like– yeah okay, I’m here _because_ of Jeno.”

 

Donghyuck is listening.

 

“Do you know how fucking annoying he is?” _Yes._ “No really, can he do _anything_ for himself? All he does is wait around for someone to baby him it’s so pathetic. It’s self-righteous, it’s dehumanizing! What self-respecting man subjects himself to that?”

 

“I baby him,” Donghyuck says, because he has a knack for picking out the important things when Jisung talks.

 

Jisung fixes him with a look. “Well baby needs you back, I’m sick of babysitting. Chenle is enough work on his own.”

 

/

 

Donghyuck gets baby back the next day. Mostly because he’s run out of money and has nowhere else to go.

 

Jeno’s apartment is on the top floor of a fifty-floor building so the trip is a little exhausting and he’s worried that the elevator is going to give out and plunge him right into the depths of hell. Wherever that is.

 

The door opens to reveal a woman about a head shorter than himself who he instantly recognizes as Jeno’s mother. She’s got this sweetness around her, like a roll of pinched dough.

 

“Hi ma’am, is Jeno here?”

 

She eyes him warily and Donghyuck is suddenly reminded of how much parents scare him.

 

Jeno’s room is messy. There are blankets and cushions littering the floor and half of the wall space is taken up by obscure band posters.

 

“You might have to wake him up,”Jeno’s mother whispers not unkindly. She gives Donghyuck this knowing look that makes him blush (Donghyuck doesn’t even blush, hey what’s up with that?) before she takes her leave. And then there’s just Donghyuck in the bear's cave.  

 

/

 

Jeno wakes up under heady hands and when Donghyuck whispers all of the sorry’s he can manage, he’s given sleep sated kisses and then pulled underneath the blankets for Jeno to have and to hold.

 

/

 

“Fuck it, whatever.”

 

“Whatever?”

 

“Everything,” Donghyuck tells him, smoothing his bangs off of Jeno’s forehead, they flop right back in place anyways. “Everything but you.”

 

Jeno looks at him for a little bit after that. Mellow, enchanting, disarming Jeno. Donghyuck zones out of the look they share and finds himself looking just past everything. He doesn’t like anything he sees. There’s swampy streetlamp light and a dirty towel, boxes of albums stacked up in the corner. Nothing is precious like Jeno is.

 

“What about me?” Jeno tugs on his sleeve, begging.

 

Little ticks fall from the 12 o’clock moon and Donghyuck’s wristwatch changes to the next minute at the same time that Donghyuck says, “You’re everything else.”

 

The incense on his bookshelf wafts around them thick enough to make Donghyuck cough a little, it’s atmospheric. Just the two of them on a cloud canopy reverie. Only it isn’t enough because Jeno presses again, this time speaking into the jut of Donghyuck’s jaw. “I like you. Do you like me?”

 

The walls glow green and yellow in the way that Hong Kong walls do. “I like you so much.”

 

“Am I your baby?”

 

“You’re my baby.”

 

Jeno kisses him first, he thinks. If he thinks. There’s no heat or passion between them, just a press of lips after the fact. The angle doesn’t even matter, Donghyuck just likes how Jeno’s mouth sounds against his. It’s vaguely wet and he can hear him breathing. It tastes honest.

 

/

 

Donghyuck is dragged off to Jaemin’s house in Victoria Peak a week later to start his groveling. The atmosphere is tense, crackling. It’s electric in the most faulty, uncute way you can imagine and then Renjun is pulling Donghyuck into the garage while everyone watches with a stillness.

 

Donghyuck feels a little like a puppy by its scruff.

 

/

 

“Why do you do it?” Renjun sounds pissed off.

 

“Do _what_?”

 

Renjun slams the garage door closed and it startles a laugh out of Donghyuck. He doesn’t know when they got like this. They used to be friends, good friends. They used to trust each other with everything but now Donghyuck can just tell that Renjun is praying on Donghyuck’s death every night.

 

That’s no good for the band.

 

“You drag him around like that, you know that he loves you and you fucking feed off of it. You’re sick. It’s so unfair to him.”

 

Donghyuck looks at Renjun for a moment, analyzes him. He toys with that thought for a moment, not long enough to hurt himself with but he mulls it over. Renjun is right. Donghyuck is unfair, he never plays fair. But he does play for revenge and Renjun bought this misery.

 

“You mean it’s unfair to you.”

 

Renjun bristles at that and Donghyuck revels in all the fun buttons he’s found to press. Renjun is just full of sensibilities and soft spots.

 

“Did you think about how unfair you were to Jeno when you led him on for months and then dropped him for whatever the hell Yukhei was? You knew, I know that you knew.”

 

Renjun freezes. Bullseye.

 

Donghyuck tries to remember the Renjun that would buy Wonder Girl stickers for his guitar from the convenience store with his pocket change. He tries to remember Renjun that fell off his roof trying to film Jung Jaehyun’s evening workout. He wants so desperately to unearth Renjun from freshman year, who only wore those ridiculous sailor moon socks and got his amp cord wrapped around his ankle so tight his toes turned purple.

 

“Is that what this is about?” Renjun asks, accusatory.

 

Donghyuck scoffs. “What the fuck else?”

 

That seems to get things going because Renjun looks properly pissed. This should be good, Donghyuck thinks, this should be fucking great.

 

“Donghyuck, I made a mistake, okay, I understand. You can’t punish me– you can’t punish _Mark_. Whatever you have against me, that’s between you and me.” His little shoulders heave cutely, like he’s livid. “Whatever the hell you feel like you owe to Jeno? It’s bullshit. Your love is bullshit.”

 

Donghyuck’s hands shake where they rest, his palms feel scorching and he tries to look at anything else. His eyes rest on the row of drumsticks behind Renjun and he wonders how they’d look jammed into his brains.

 

“What would you know about love? You’re the odd one out Renjun, they were all mine before they were yours. All you get is sloppy seconds, right? That’s why you’re so invested in Mark, isn’t it? You’re mad because no matter how much of a project you try to work him out to be, he’ll always be mine first, he’ll always be my little bitch no matter how hard you work for it.”

 

He doesn’t even know where the words are coming from, they taste a little like acid and part of him is horrified by it all. Part of him wants to fake his own death so he can take a nap. Renjun’s face looks like Donghyuck’s stomach feels; Crumpled and sick. He barely notices how the voices on the other side of the wall have gone silent.

 

“Mark deserves better than all of us, get a fucking clue. I can’t help who he loves. He deserves better than someone who stood Jeno up, date after date and ignored his calls because you were too chicken to let him go, you fucking attention whore.”

 

“Donghyuck.”

 

He’s done it now. He can feel the shock of what he’s just said rattling up his bones. Nice.

 

Mark looks stupid against the door frame. He looks stupid and exhausted and mad too. Renjun looks caught in the act. Caught because finally, he’s not able to shield Mark from all of this. Caught because Mark knows he’s in love, probably.

 

The way Mark is looking at Donghyuck, like he’s discovered something new and ugly in his place, is probably what drives Donghyuck to say the next thing.

 

“I’m quitting the band.”  

 

/

 

Donghyuck falls into Jeno’s bed, covers his head with the pillow and caves in under Jeno’s hands on his back.

 

/

 

Donghyuck goes back to school that year, finishing out the year with decent grades and two offers to schools in Hong Kong.

 

Jeno’s mom takes him in and it isn’t hard to see where Jeno gets his eternal sweetness from.

 

Her only rule is _no funny business._ There’s plenty of funny business.

 

/

 

“I hate rock n’ roll,” Donghyuck tells Jeno one morning when they’re sitting in his kitchen window, hoping for the spring breeze to wash the acrid cigarette smoke out of their clothes and hair.

 

Jeno looks up at him from under overgrown bangs, “Yeah?”

 

Donghyuck nods. He takes a sip of his coffee (5 sugars and a cup of creamer). He fucking hates coffee.

 

“What do you like?”

 

 _You._ “Like… Frank Ocean and shit.”

 

Jeno smiles up at him big and precious. “Frank Ocean? Isn’t he like gay?”

 

Donghyuck bites into his knuckle and meets Jeno’s eyes under the paper moon. “Yeah he’s bisexual.”

 

/

 

By the time summer comes around Donghyuck is dazed into a holy state. His days are glazed over and pepperholed by sun showers. Jeno breaks it all up with dry seasons, tucks him in at night and holds him tight in the sea breeze.

 

/

 

Surprisingly, or not, he can never tell anymore, Renjun comes around first.

 

He comes around drunk but he comes around.

 

“Lee Donghyuck open this door before I come in there and fucking– do _something._ ” Donghyuck doesn’t open the door at first. For approximately two reasons.

 

  1. He’s got Jeno’s fingers in his mouth and any attempt to speak would be stupid
  2. Renjun is probably going to do _something_ anyways



 

That only works for a good thirty seconds though because then, Jeno’s big moon eyes win out over Donghyuck’s petty attitude. They always do. Like a dog on a fucking leash.

 

“Yeah yeah,” He starts, voice muffled into the hoodie Jeno tugs over his head for him. “M’coming.”

 

Renjun looks small on Donghyuck’s doormat. He’s drowning in a Vancouver hockey team hoodie that Donghyuck knows is Mark’s.

 

“Let’s stop fighting,” Renjun tells him like he really means it.

 

 _Yeah, okay._ “Did you walk all the way here drunk? Where’s Mark and Jaemin?”

 

Renjun ignores him and shoulders his way into the apartment. Jeno is gone, something about needing to shower, and whatnot. It’s bullshit he just wants to hide from Renjun. Dogs vs. Cats and all.

 

“You’ve been such an asshole,” Renjun tells him and makes himself comfortable on the couch.

 

“I know.”

 

“We’re best friends Hyuck, you know that? We’re best friends. Bros before hoes.”

 

Donghyuck pauses by the refrigerator. Deep down he knows that he’d choose Jeno over everything, over himself. But Renjun is right, they’re best friends.

 

The couch dips under Donghyuck when he settles in next to Renjun. “I’m sorry.”

 

A pair of smaller hands find Donghyuck’s, squeezing his hand. “I know.”

 

The channel on the TV turns to static and the sound from Jeno’s shower fills the space between them. Donghyuck wonders when they got so far apart.

 

“Mark misses you.”

 

That one doesn’t feel good. No it fucking doesn’t. It probably isn't supposed to anyway. He isn't sure how to feel about it. By all means, Mark should have told Donghyuck to go fuck himself, to kick rocks, to, in the least literal sense, suck it. Because that's what he deserves right?

 

“Are you together now?” Donghyuck finds himself replying in spite of the burning urge to test if jumping from the window this high up would kill him.

 

Renjun’s fingers flex in Donghyuck’s grip and even through his drunken stupor his cheeks visibly heat up. “Yeah. He asked me two weeks ago. It’s been… good, it’s good.”

 

An ambulance passes outside, sirens raising hell and the lights filter through the blinds casting the living room in slants of reds and greens. Renjun sighs and settles into Donghyuck’s shoulder.

 

“You’re so melancholy Hyuck did you know that? You won’t be like your dad, don’t trip about it dude. Smile a bit. You’re gravitational.”

 

Donghyuck doesn’t know what the fuck that is supposed to mean, but he gets it. So when Jeno moseys out from the shower, emerging from the shadows in his sweet tentative way, Donghyuck smiles.

 

/

 

Mark’s black Jansport bag is slung over one shoulder and there’s red sharpy doodle’s over his white high tops. He looks good, happy. If Donghyuck has to pinpoint a difference between Mark last year and Mark now it’s the shoulders. He looks lighter.

 

“Hey.”

 

A feeling a warmth and nervousness jitters through Donghyuck’s whole body. He feels like he’s on crack or something.

 

“Hi.”

 

There’s a tender space between them, like healing pink burn scars. There’s something else too, like relief. Something new and something sweet.

 

“Missed you.” Mark says at the same time that Donghyuck says. “I’m sorry.”

 

Mark smiles and slings an arm over Donghyuck’s shoulder. Everything is going to be fine.

 

/

 

It’s June 6th again and for once in a very long time. The world feels right.  

 

Donghyuck comes back to Jeno in the night time, like he always does. Jeno’s parents are out for their anniversary, coincidentally the same day as Donghyuck’s birthday.

 

He’s home for a few moments before Jeno is telling him that he needs to shower, he looks suspicious. Suspicious in a good way. Boys like Jeno don’t have mysteries and when they do, they’re _darling_ ones.

 

Jeno emerges from the bathroom half an hour later with his hair dripping over the Blinders band t-shirt. His legs are bare and it takes Donghyuck a full minute to realize the Big Idea.

 

“Those are kind of skimpy,” he trails off referring to the lacey black _thing_ Jeno is near spilling out of. He tries to hide his amusement but he can tell from Jeno’s challenging look that he’s failing miserably. Screw Park Jisung.

 

They watch each other for a moment, hearts beating out of tune. “Thought you’d like it,” Jeno informs him, and then he’s moving towards Donghyuck who rises up on his elbows. He feels his mouth go dry and his mind wanders, he feels a little predatory.

 

Big eyes blink down at him, cooler and more patient. Donghyuck’s hands flit up to Jeno’s hip at the same time that the speaker from the kitchen switches to some Phil Collins song. Jeno’s hand comes down to stroke over Donghyuck’s cheek.

 

“Happy birthday.”

 

/

 

**_Jaemin 1:45 am_ **

hey!! happy birthday hyuckie~

 

glad to see u and mark made up,  
we’ve really missed u (ง •̀ω•́)ง✧

 

**_Hyuck Lee 3:00 am_ **

Missed u too

You still need me over there?

 

**_Jaemin 3:03am_ **

always hyuck ♡

 


	2. jaemin and the chipmunks: the squeakuel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> a series of long-overdue apologies.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi!! popping back in to give u all some healthy communication bc i couldn't just leave hyuck a mess like that! dont forget to check out this [art](https://twitter.com/ramenjae/status/1113760943836553216/) from my fav grace <3

SCENE: One boy comes alive in another boy’s arms. Spring light skitters off the rooftops of the world and t-shirt apologies are in progress. 

 

Jeno’s voice is ash soft, baseless in a way that makes the world feel like a shoebox, confined and sorted. Neat. 

 

“I don’t like you when you act that way.”

 

There’s a little gaping hole in time for the second that comes after, the place where Donghyuck is supposed to feel upset by this, self-righteous about it. But this is Jeno so that space is substituted for something more worthwhile, worth love. 

 

“I’m sorry,” He tells him, straight. Because Jeno deserves that, an apology. Jeno nods, so Donghyuck continues. “I’m sorry for kissing Mark, you deserved better. I’m sorry for being so angry. I’m sorry for never talking about  _ it _ because I want you to know I trust you I’m just not ready, I think.”

 

Jeno crowds in closer, nose almost aligned with Donghyuck’s mouth, he could lean forward and kiss the tip of Jeno’s nose if he wanted, and he wants, so he does. “I’ll wait for you Hyuck, just wait for me too okay?”

 

Donghyuck nods, so that the minute movement presses another kiss to Jeno’s face, this time to the bridge of his nose. God makes boys like Jeno so that boys like Donghyuck can learn patience, learn kindling. Donghyuck has no interest in either of those things though and Jeno is just too damn kissable, so that’s what he does, kisses him. 

 

SCENE: three blocks away from reconciliation, and a bedroom topped to the brim of real love, another love story starts. 

  
  
  


/

  
  
  


“Park,” Donghyuck wheezes, “Jisung.” 

 

Then, like, six feet of  _ boy  _ turn around and Donghyuck is in the headlights. The sun blinks on and off for one second while Donghyuck catches his breath and then he hobbles over to where Jisung is waiting, always waiting. 

 

Donghyuck’s legs burn and his heart does a little too. That’s what happens when you run uphill for five blocks. It’s all for a cause though, it’s all for saving love, real love. 

 

A shop owner three stores down watches them with eagle eyes. 

  
  


/

  
  


It’s after their newest gig that Donghyuck snaps, in a couple of ways. 

 

Snaps like Jeno pressed against the bathroom door, Donghyuck’s heartbeat-mouth at his throat and something wet dripping into his collar. 

 

“Can I?” Donghyuck comes up for air breathless, hand waiting at Jeno’s shirt hem. 

 

Jeno likes this Donghyuck, wants to bathe in him. “Can you?” cocky bastard. 

 

“Don’t dick around Jen, I’m in love with you right now.”

 

Jeno pulls away, fucking pulls  _ away. _ Metaphase love. “Just right now?” His voice goes thick with this kind of bigness to it, a bigness that fills their whole little world but outside of their bubble it’s just plaintive. He’s joking though he always is, never that serious. Jeno is never serious. Except for when he is, but he isn’t, really. 

 

“Always, Jen, I’m always in love with you.” 

 

And when Jeno seems satisfied, he pulls Donghyuck’s hands back to the hem of his shirt where it rucks up under their fingers. He gives Donghyuck an inch, and he takes the mile, the world. Five galaxies over and Donghyuck is still going. 

  
  


/ 

  
  


“Do you think Jisung would want to go?” Jaemin asks, perched upon the kitchen counter like a eulogy to false and flimsy romance. “With me?”

 

He’s in it, for the long run. 

 

“Do you want me to ask him?” Donghyuck is timid, relearning how to breathe. 

 

Jaemin ponders on that for a second, empty mug in hand. Darkness blazes up one half of his kitchen from where the hallway light has winked out. “I think I’d like him, want him. Could you? He’s just out of school now it’s almost two.”

 

Jisung’s phone is broken, something that is  _ not  _ Donghyuck’s fault. These days not many things are and he’s trying. Truly. 

 

He could for Jaemin, fix things. Bargain his past for Jaemin’s future, fixer upper. 

 

So he runs. 

  
  


/

  
  


Donghyuck’s apology to Renjun goes a little like, taking him back to the basics. There’s a new world thriving. Like some pioneer species from an ecological succession. Wiped away and regrowing again, always regrowing. 

 

There’s handheld apologies where they sit side by side and relearn their mistakes. There’s whispered apologies where they try to fix things, really fix things. And there are days where Renjun is so in love with Mark and Mark is so in love with Renjun that Donghyuck feels like everything has been swallowed comfortably by one big black hole. 

 

New beginnings start here and loops break off then restart but most importantly, Renjun continues to spend all his pocket change on Wonder Girls stickers. 

 

/

 

Mark is a good guy, better than most. He’s perfect for first love, safe because Mark isn’t a heartbreaker, not by nature. He’s not Donghyuck’s first love though, not even his second. Donghyuck doesn’t ever truly love Mark how he wants himself to and so he doesn’t push it. 

 

Mark is a good guy, so he never asks for Donghyuck to try. Donghyuck still tries though. He tries hard too, to love Mark. 

 

In the end, it all works out somehow. There’s a few jagged pieces of  _ what if _ poking around in places but it all works out, it works out. 

 

Mark is a good guy so he lets Donghyuck back in. 

 

SCENE: It’s Tuesday afternoon, it’s, less specifically, the golden space in spring. Hazy ocher before the baking starts. The breeze before the endless fire of a concrete jungle. Something misty hangs in the air, feels a little like nervous hands and an infallible urge towards paper lantern love and green rain. Flyers on the wall of the club’s backroom are nearly shredded to pieces and then pasted over. 

 

Mark is wearing basketball shorts and his jittery knuckles are finding their way around a drumstick. He seems calm, a subterranean object of omniscience. Donghyuck can tell that Mark can see the future, he knows what’s going to happen. 

 

So that’s why when Donghyuck heaves himself from the stained beanbag and deposits himself in Mark’s lap, he doesn’t bat an eye. This is all second nature, second hand. 

 

They’re alone in here, the rest of the band is out pressuring free drinks out of the bartender and Jeno has class. It’s as good a time as any to corner Mark, pin him down and say all the words he knows Donghyuck is going to say. 

 

“Mark,” Donghyuck starts, rather importantly. “I think we got off on the wrong foot.”

 

It’s conventional, a standard-issue apology. Nevermind that their first foot was about seven years ago, Donghyuck isn’t sure about apologies. He knows about guitars and he knows his way around a car engine just fine too, he knows about making Jeno gasp like he’s going to die and keen up into his hands. He knows how to gut a fish properly, wonders sometimes if it works on humans too. Gut himself and toss away the skin. Apologies though, that’s more foreign than he’d like to admit. Growing up he was never on the receiving end of one and he isn’t sure how to start, not exactly. 

 

But Mark can read the future not Donghyuck’s mind so he says, “Say what you mean.” 

 

That gets things going a bit, because Mark is a good guy, best of em’ all. 

 

“I guess then, I’ll say, I’m sorry. I’m not sorry for not loving you back because you don’t want me to be sorry for that.” He  _ is _ sorry for it. “But I’m sorry for taking more than I give, and I’m sorry for what I did to Renjun.” He breathes in, a little rattley like a dusty box fan. “I’m sorry for not trying to be better than I was and I’m sorry that I didn’t start till now. I didn’t want to be like them,” His parents. “But I was, and I want to take it all back.” 

 

He learns that, apologizing, is a little like dying. And Mark is a good guy so dying like this, suits Donghyuck just fine. 

 

SCENE: It’s the hazy limbo between afternoon and evening and one boy dies in another boy’s arms. The outside world ticks like one big clock.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> [twt](https://twitter.com/crushcults) \+ [cc](https://curiouscat.me/crushcults)  
> kudos & comments mean a lot!


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